1. Field of the Invention:
The present invention relates to a method of eradicating unwanted vegetation, such as marijuana plants, located in a remote or relatively inaccessible area.
2. Description of the Prior Art:
Drug producing plants, such as marijuana plants, have gained prominence as a source of drugs which might be exploited as a lucrative source of illegal income. Efforts by law enforcement agencies to discourage or limit the cultivation and harvesting of such illegal plants have led to the proposal of numerous different methods of eradication.
Because of the difficulty of gaining access to such remote locations, national forests and reserves have become particularly popular as locations for the planting and cultivation of such illegal plants.
One method employed to eradicate illegal vegetation in locals where the terrain is relatively inaccessible is the deployment to the locale of a number of drug enforcement agents who then manually attack the crop in a laborious and time consuming manner by severing each plant one by one, transporting the severed plants to a centralized location and destroying said plants.
Another conventional approach, particularly for plants in relatively inaccessible areas, has been to first send out spotter personnel in a spotter helicopter for the purpose of spotting illicit plants for subsequent eradication. Once located, the coordinates of the spotting are recorded and upon returning to base, an eradication team is typically sent out by a transport helicopter to hover over the spotted area to permit the team to rappel thereinto for the purpose of either prematurely harvesting and burning the crop or applying herbicides thereto. This approach has proven relatively inefficient and time consuming thus imposing an excessive burden on the tax payers and unduly drawing from the available work force.
Other approaches long relied upon in endeavoring to eradicate such remotely located crops has been to actually transport a storage tank of herbicide in a helicopter directed to a hovering position typically elevated some 100' or more over the terrain on which the crop is growing. Typically the apparatus utilized for application of the herbicide is somewhat unsophisticated, often involving nothing more than a length of hose suspending a shower head type nozzle to the general proximity of the offending plants in hopes that the nozzle head can be positioned over the target plant. This approach suffers the shortcoming that the liquid herbicide can sometimes coagulate in the nozzle. Additionally, the dangling nozzle head is blown and swayed under the influence of various undulations of the hose brought about by the helicopter rotor down wash, helicopter movement and general wind currents. Experience has proven that the pendulum action of the hose and nozzle itself results in imprecise focusing of the herbicide spray thus resulting in the nozzle head frequently passing back and forth over the top of and to the sides of the target plants thus spraying a relatively large area surrounding the plant thus consuming an unwarranted volume of herbicide leading to waste and possible contamination of the surrounding vegetation. Moreover, the dwell time for the helicopter hovering over the crop of plants is considerable due to the fact that, unless the entire area is to be broadcast sprayed, each plant must be dealt with individually and for a sufficient time to assure that the swinging nozzle head treats both the leaf surface to such an extent that some penetration is provided to the vulnerable underside of the plant leaves. Due to the expense of helicopter operation, this then is not only a tedious but an expensive task.
Thus, there exists a need for an effective system for delivering measured quantities of herbicide at relatively precise locations on the target plants to be eradicated to thereby provide for effective delivery in precise quantities at pinpointed locations on offending plants on a remote and difficult terrain.
The present invention contemplates the use of a pressurized gun to impel frangible herbicide charged balls from a vehicle such as a helicopter to impact the stems or branches of a plant to cause the balls to burst, thus splashing the herbicide on the leaves of the plants.
Pressurized guns and frangible balls containing colored liquid paint have long been known for use in entertainment games wherein contestants shoot the balls at a velocity which will, while avoiding impact on the person of a competitor with sufficient force to cause undue pain or injury, will cause the ball skin to burst to splash the contained paint on the person thus creating a mark to identify the loser of the contest. The method of using such guns is not, however, satisfactory for eradicating offending plants from a remote distance, as from a helicopter platform, since the paint utilized would not be toxic to the plant and the muzzle velocity of such guns is insufficient to impart sufficient velocity to the frangible balls to propel them accurately through the down wash from the helicopter rotor on a sufficiently accurate flight path to strike the plant with a sufficient degree of precision to be practical.
Moreover, the skin membrane of such paint balls is typically without sufficient strength to withstand the relatively high muzzle velocities which must be imparted to the herbicide balls for the desired accuracy and impact forces necessary to assure bursting of the skin membrane upon impact.
It has also been known to utilize a pressurized gun to deliver a marker pellet to be used as a marker for marking the trunks of trees to be thinned from a forest. These guns are, however, typically intended for close range application thus requiring only low muzzle velocity and the pellets typically employ membrane skin which bursts under relatively modest forces substantially less than the comparatively high forces imposed by the high muzzle velocities necessary for proper operation of the herbicide charged balls of my invention.